After a conversation with someone that went on all night, but I didn't take much persuading, and the next day I was a vegetarian. It came down to one question, can you be healthy without killing animals? If the answer is 'yes' then the only reason you're killing is because you like the taste. But you can't take a life just because you like its taste.

It sounds very pretentious, but I don't lie. It's too uncomfortable. A lot of people think because you're an actor that makes you a good liar, but one of the things I can't articulate is a bad lie.

It would be nice to be a professional pilot. I'm an amateur pilot at the moment. I've got a lot of friends in the RAF and I don't think I've ever met a group of people who love their job as much as they do.

I tend to get starstruck with sports people. I was on a chat show with retired Scottish footballer Denis Law and I just lost it and couldn't talk to him.

I worked with Judi Dench in Cranford. She's not at all starry, she's very easy and funny to be around, but I had such an enormous respect and regard for her before I met her that I was quite starstruck.

I like watching DVDs, flying my plane, walking and going to my place in Scotland. I like yoga. It takes me a while to unwind, the subconscious parts of my mind take a while to catch up with the rest of me.

My very first professional job was with a theatre company in 1965 and the first job they gave me was literally shovelling sh*t. I was an assistant stage manager and they told me to clear out the prop store. I opened it up and no-one had been in there for 25 years and it was inches deep in rat sh*t. So before I could get anywhere I had to clear it up. I thought, 'All these years of training, the best drama school in the world, and this is what I'm doing.'